Microsoft says Minecraft will Definitely come to Windows Phone

Administrator

08:33, September 23, 2014

Now that the Microsoft / Minecraft deal is official, the Redmond-based company seems to be determined to bring the game to its mobile platform, Windows Phone.
Rumors on the possible porting of the smash hit title to the Windows Phone platform surfaced late last year, but Mohjang, while it didn’t reject the idea of starting working on the project, claimed that developing for Microsoft’s mobile operating system was not that easy.

According to a company’s employee “the problem is that Windows Phone uses a different API for rendering (DirectX vs OpenGL), and the Minecraft code has bad separation between the game logic and rendering. We are not saying ‘no’, but it’s currently not being worked on, as it’s a big project to fix.”

This happened in November 2013 and there’s still no word on a possible Windows Phone port of Minecraft. However, now that Minecraft belongs to Microsoft, things will certainly change and it’s no surprise that the company wants to bring the title to as many of its OSes as possible.

And it looks like the news has been recently confirmed by Phil Spencer, head of Microsoft’s Xbox team, who has promised that Minecraft will eventually come to Windows Phone.

Although these weren’t his exact words, Spencer replied affirmatively to a question from a Minecraft fan who wanted to see the game ported to Windows 8.1 and Windows Phone.

Even though Xbox’s boss did not share any additional details on the matter, Windows Phone users can rest easy as Minecraft will certainly arrive on Microsoft’s mobile operating system no matter how hard it will be to port the game or how long it will take. Here is hoping Windows Phone users will be able to play Minecraft on their smartphones sooner rather than later.

It’s also worth mentioning that Minecraft may only be available on certain devices running specific versions of Windows Phone, but more details will probably be provided after Microsoft assesses the situation.

Although this is good news for Windows Phone users, we can’t help but think whether or not Microsoft needs to purchase every other popular app or game out there in order to bring it to its mobile platform.

Candy Crush, one of the most popular Android/iOS mobile games has yet to be launched on Windows Phone, even though rumors on the possible porting date back to early 2014.

Many other important apps and games have yet to make their way to Microsoft’s mobile platform and most of those that eventually made it to Windows Phone arrived later than their counterparts (Android, iOS).